


Apples

by ArcherHybrid



Series: Labor of Love [6]
Category: The Hobbit (Jackson Movies)
Genre: F/M, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-31
Updated: 2013-12-31
Packaged: 2018-01-06 21:20:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1111653
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ArcherHybrid/pseuds/ArcherHybrid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kili's feeling ill, and Tauriel plays nursemaid</p>
            </blockquote>





	Apples

**Author's Note:**

> I don't know where this particular idea came from but by the time I was done, I had THIS. Please review it!!

His stomach grumbled. He tried to hide it. But he hadn’t eaten in days, and it was becoming more and more noticeable. His body had thinned out more. His energy was lacking. He could eat a wild boar right now and still have enough room left over for more. These captors of his did well enough to keep the company fed – they might be the enemy, but they proved they weren’t monsters – though Kili never ate what was given to him. He left it. And it became old, and rotten. They would mutter to themselves when his plates were removed, wondering amongst themselves if the young one’s plan was to starve himself to death. Not a great plan.

And then one evening, Tauriel was doing rounds. She passed through the underground tunnels, and then the dungeon where their prisoners were kept. Most of them had been sleeping. There were a few still awake. But when she walked by Kili’s cell, she so happened to notice the state he was in. Huddled into a corner, arms wrapped around himself, head leaning against solid rock, soft moaning falling free of his lips.

She stopped just outside the cell bars and looked through them at this young dwarf, in a different way as she had before. The look on her face was more somber, and then she called out to him, but did not turn to face her right away; he knew she was there – the perfume drifting off her body, wafting through his nostrils, was giving him a headache. Though it could always be blamed on not eating for several days, and not the sweet smelling perfume she wore.

When he didn’t answer her the second time, Tauriel reached into a pocket of her tunic and retrieved the keys. As they jingled about, Fili had climbed to his feet and pressed his face to the bars, demanding to know what this “she-elf” was planning. She said nothing to him. Merely glancing his way but not softening her look. The keys continued to jingle as she unlocked the cell door, then she dropped them back into her pocket as she opened the door.

Kili shifted, and turned his head, then leaned up as much as possible, before he moaned again and shuffled his body into the corner, tugging at his tunic, turning over away from her. Tauriel frowned, the stepped forward and crouched in front of him. She heard his stomach rumble, then her eyes were drawn to the uneaten plate of food. He hadn’t even touched it.

She had been told by fellow guards that every effort to offer him food had failed, and he not touched a single bite of anything they had brought him. “Why have you not eaten?” She asked, fully aware of this, so at least have something to go on.

Despite the rumble in his belly, Kili shied away, “…I feel ill,” he cried, barely a whisper, and he whimpered like a pathetic child when she lifted her hand to his forehead.

“You are a little warm.” Then she pulled her hand back and stood. “I will bring you some herbal soup. You should not have nothing in your stomach.” Tauriel picked up the plate of food then walked back out of the cell, having not heard Kili’s mumbling protests, then careful manipulated the keys back into her right hand, locking the door back up tight.

“Psst,” came the noise from another cell, and Tauriel looked around, until she heard the noise again, then she walked up to the cell holding the golden-blonde dwarf, “Do you have any apples?”

“I beg your pardon, dwarf?”

Fili rolled his eyes, hands gripping the cell bars. “Apples. Green ones. Do you have them?” And the way he looked at her was not as he did the first they saw of each other. She nods. “He likes green apples. Not the red ones,” she turned away, and he added, before she had left, “And they must be sliced.”

The kitchen was dark when she got there, so she lit a candle and let the flame fester on the wooden counter top, while she fled to the pantry and grabbed a bowl of apples. She rummaged for a green one, specifically, pushing the others aside. She snatched a cutting board, and a kitchen knife, and sliced up the apple into small bites.

Tauriel mixes up an herbal tea with chamomile, then balances it in the same hand as she does the small plate of apples, and leaves the kitchen, making her way back to the cells.

She finds him still clutching his arms around himself, leaning against the far wall, groaning inaudibly. She passes the mug of herbal tea with one hand and rummages in her tunic pocket for the keys. The cell door is unlocked, and Tauriel walks in. She sets the plate down in front of him, and the tea, then presses her hand to his forehead again.

Tauriel snatches a slice of the green apple, and holds it out to him. “The golden-haired one in the cell next to yours tells me of your fondness for green apples.” He looks at it, and she smiles a little when he takes it from her. Tauriel pulls the plate closer and he takes another.

After some time, when the slices of green apples had been eaten, she picks up the herbal tea and instructs him to sip it, carefully. Kili finishes it slowly, and Tauriel puts it aside as she had done with the empty plate.

He eventually succumbs to sleep and a yawn escapes him. His eyes begin to droop. He curls up against her, resting his head on her lap, and Tauriel cannot help but to smile. She ends up staying with him until she is assure he sleeps soundly, then she slips out of his cell.

She returns to him the next day. His fever’s broken, and he requests more green apples. She obliges with a smile.


End file.
